I’ve posted about a wrist cuff before and today had to share with you another one. This triple-strand cuff from Amy over at Ponder and Stitch is so different in its design. She’s named it “Triple strand retro print fabric cuff bracelet in the best colors ever”, which is pretty much the coolest item name ever. And so true, at that! I am a big fan of reds and blues combined together (my wedding colors!). The button detail is so bright and fabulous, the triple stranded fabric bands so different and beautiful on the arm. Perfect for summer.

Sorry that I missed Friday’s Item! Bus-Stop Boy had been away all week fishing so I was on my own with Miss Sunshine — needless to say, by the time the end of the week rolled around I was feeling a bit stretched. That said, welcome to the second to last day of June.

As we move into July, all I can think about is wearing sweet skirts and dresses. The Tea Roses Jumper from Dep over at Depanneure Royale is light and summery and fun. She pulls her jumpers together from a variety of beautiful fabrics — I just happen to be particularly taken with this lovely rose cotton. I LOVE love love the button detail at the shoulders. I just want to slip this on and run through a field.

Yeah yeah, I know it’s June and that most of us are wearing shorts and tank tops. Certainly isn’t the BEST time for winter-wear, but this just has to be shared today, season notwithstanding. This crocheted long cape from Crochetlina Couture is so stunning, so thoughtful, so meticulous. I love the drape, the colors, that fringed opening down the side, the keyhole at the neck. So beautiful. Can’t take it.

You are BEAUTIFUL--blueish green-jade-ocker- brownish mix- stripes knitted LONG cape

Doesn’t this pink loofah from befriendmantic’s Crafty Delights look divine?? I’ve never seen a crocheted bath sponge before and I totally love it! The pink is so bright and fun – I can imagine how soft and luscious it must feel all dripping with soapy bubbles. My current washcloth would be no match for this little scrubber.

I’ve had my eye on this for a while now and don’t know why it’s taken me so long to share it with you. Grace over at Grace Hester Design has some truly adorable, but not too cutesy-cutesy, graphic prints. I love this Dragonfly print in particular – the color, the proportions, how it’s both simple and striking. What’s even more great is that it includes the simplified dragonfly name in a language of your choosing — French, Spanish, Chinese… She has many other animals to choose from, as well. How fun it would be to collect and display an entire set!

The big day is here! Angie over at The Creative Mama is celebrating her 100th post by hosting a Day of Giveaways!! I am lucky enough to be a part of it and am excited to send off the goodies to whomever the lucky winners are. There are two pouches up for grabs so definitely head over and enter.

Angie is incredibly supportive of creative women runing their own little businesses, so be sure to browse around through all of the fun items she has up for grabs. This is the first giveway that I’ve been a part of and I am very happy and grateful for it.

Take a pause for just one minute on this lovely Monday morning to check out today’s totally awesome item – a felt and linen apple tree WITH…so rad…a felt basket of felt apples!!! This Tree of the Wind Apple Tree from Intres would make the most charming centerpiece or mantle decoration. And while the small parts might not be the best for my uber-curious 9 month old right now, I can imagine this to be a pretty sweet part of a child’s make-believe world. Snag these and one of her Princess Towers to create and entire scene. Learn more about Intres here.

I currently don’t own anything like this….but now I want to. This black and white cotton dress/skirt/tube top works so well in so many different ways. I seriously love every permutation of the piece, especially when paired with the red belt. Everything my Miarae over at Bewakeful is so different and inspired – the photography alone is a reason to go visit.

I have a little stockpile of favorite items and shops that I like to pick my Awesome Item from every day. I just found this item about a minute ago, though, and couldn’t wait to share it with you. This kitchen towel and dishcloth set over at The Mudd Puddle is so bright and happy – perfect for some summertime space sprucing up. The colors, design, and stitching details are so pretty and well thought out – I’m actually feeling inspired to do a bit of decorating.

Okay. This pretty much looks like pure luxury. I like to imagine slipping this amazing Kimono from Plum Pretty Sugar on in the morning or after a shower, floating around my house and feeling just oh so fancy as I do the dishes and feed the baby. Seriously — we all need something so elegant and special, especially on those days when we’re feeling a bit plain. I love this particular kimono for the drape, the colors, that the silk comes from travels to India; it’s all very mysterious and fanciful, just what I need sometimes on a Wednesday morning.

Sometimes I stumble across an Item that I just find so unique and creative and different; like the, “I’ve never seen anything like this,” kind of scene. This RSS Icon Pillow over at Craftsquatch is one such item. I mean, inspiration is found in the craziest of places; in this case, that tiny little orange icon we click on any time we want to follow a website we like. Who would ever think, though, to use it as a pillow design??? This guy. Awesome.

I’ve spent some time outside in my day and have seen plenty of cairns scattered about, usually as markers of a particular turn in a trail or perhaps a special spot on the land. I don’t think I realized it until I found this Awesome Item: I love cairns.

Jenifer Glagowski of her self-titled etsy shop is an accomplished artist with an entire Cairn series of paintings, notecards, and pendants. The pendants, in particular, caught my eye – they are striking, beautiful, and just the right size as necklaces go. There is just something about them that I find so….. mysterious. And significant.

There are a lot of people that I miss. I’m originally from California and my parents still live in LA. My younger brother is in Berkeley, my older brother in Tennessee with his awesome wife, my sister-in-law. I have amazing friends scattered all over the country and I keep wishing that somehow, some way, we could all just gather and live in the town of my dreams, where everyone I love is within walking distance of one another and the beach. We’d also waterski all the time.

Until then, I see them all when I can and try as often as possible to express to them my love and missing-ness. This card from Rose at the great lakes is a sweet and simple way of sharing all of those feelings with the ones we wish we could see more often. Pick up a few of these and some of those beautiful silhouette cards and start taking advantage of the pleasure and joy of snail mail.

Check out my little Miss Sunshine in her radical Snuggle Bunny tee from Hobcamp Crafts. I’ve talked about how awesome they are before; here’s just one more reason to check out and love all of their fabulous goodies.

I wish I’d known about this girl when I was getting married. Seriously. Christine of Modern Romance has some of the most beautiful wedding accessories. I am going gaga, in particular, over this particular shoulder wrap — oh my it is so gorgeous. This is the perfect thing to have around for after the ceremony when it’s getting a bit cool and you just need a little something to cover your shoulders. And can you imagine picking on up in RED? How dramatic and wonderful, the idea of tossing that on before the cake gets cut. If you feel you need a little more, she has equally as stunning capelets and fuller wraps.

I think it’s really important to occassionaly try and send out notes to your friends, on real paper, for no reason more specific than just to say hi and that you’re thinking about them. I’m not saying that I’m GOOD at sticking to this, but every so often I like to pull out a pretty card, write a letter — even if it’s just a few words long – and pop it in the mail. In this age of electronic communication, I know how nice it is to get a sweet piece of snail mail.

These amazing silhouette notecards from Meagan at Brown Pigeon would be the perfect vehicle for some positive, hand-written vibes. The gorgeous shape of the hand-cut flat card can be seen through the bright persimmon velum envelope — it’s something different and unique and just so pretty. I mean, can you imagine finding this in your mailbox?? Total happiness.

I seem to be on a felt and miniatures kick. I have loved tiny little things since I was a tiny little thing. I remember having this shadow box up in my room where I kept my miniature animals. You know when you go to gift shops, you see them on those roundabout displays — diminutive creatures glued on to squares of paper. When you take the creature off, little remnants of the paper invariably stay stuck to the the bottom of the animal’s paws/hooves/flippers/appendages. Do you know what I’m talking about?

Anyway, these mini banana and peanut butter sandwich charms from RB over at Clay Connections are so spot on and charming. She suggests using them as Best Friend charms, which I secretly want to do, even though I have no idea if my friend likes the peanut butter/banana combo. Regardless, these are definitely being added to my list of favorite minis.

These simply radiate happiness and positivity and I love them. Can you imagine how cool it would be to see someone wearing this? How secretly happy it would make you? Jane over at me make has taken her love of ribbon writing and turned it into some awesome felt neck pieces. And if you don’t want to wear them you can hang them next to your Now or Never sign and just soak in the good vibes as your day begins.

Another cool thing about Jane’s shop is that it, too, captures a unified theme and vision while having many different kinds of items – jewelry, bags, brooches… head on over to check it out.

First are some folded notecards from one of my favorite etsy sellers, Heather at heatherjeany. More than just the crafter of super beautiful paper goods, she is an incredibly awesome person.

Next was this perfect bit & lil bit t-shirt for Miss Sunshine. It’s right in line with many of the things I’ve been reading these days and how I hope she feels about how she spends her time as she gets older.

Finally are these incredibly cute hair pins from Wren Handmade – they have an etsy shop and a sweet little blog where you can read more about these and other fun goodies.

Oh boy is this sweet. It’s a tiny ACEO (Art Card, Editions and Original — learn something new every day!) measuring just 3.5″ x 2.5″. Jennifer over at tiny art by j. mullin creates such awesome little multi-media gems. This collage uses just magazine pages – what a pretty way to repurpose our subscriptions, yes? What resonated most with me about this one is the little “We” right in the middle of the flower — something about it just warms my heart. This piece is one of many truly beautiful little items; frame one to display in a now-empty space or many of them for a charming ensemble.

I was psyched to discover this sweet little shop last night. Usually I am a bit wary when I’m looking at too many different kinds of things in one place — there’s just something about seeing hats, pendants, and paintings all in the same shop that give me pause as a buyer. Not that the seller isn’t great at all three of those things; I just think it’s difficult to pull together a unifying theme amongst such different creative mediums.

No so with Devon‘s shop, Stella + Hodge. For the first time I found myself thinking, “wow. That stationery and those pieces of jewelry really look like they BELONG together.” It’s very clear that Devon knows who she is as a designer — her vision really comes through in both her paper goods and her beaded items. Everything is unified, bright, clean – I really love it.

Given that my creative energies are focused on sewing these days, I just had to pick these sewing-themed cards as today’s Awesome Item. I love the colors and the simplicity of each design. The make me want to write little notes and mail them off to all of my friends.

It’s not like I can’t ride a bike where I live. Every weekend there are large groups of cyclists heading up and down our street. I almost walked in to the path of a biker just this past Saturday at seven in the morning, but that’s a whole other story.

If you head over to Piermont you can find a rider and his or her bike at this one coffee shop at almost any time of day, taking a break from their trek up from Manhattan. Even if I were to just take a few turns around the block like all of the kids I see riding around, that would probably feel just fabulous, especially on a perfect Summer Day. I will add “start biking” to my list of things to do, right under starting an herb garden and getting my haircut. For now, my biking will get done on the west coast, every summer during my family’s Newport trip.

You’ve seen a bike once before as the Awesome Item, and today I have another one. I love how simple this piece is from Drew over at The Maple Ridge and that it ties together riding a bike with making friends. Both things make me happy, so why wouldn’t a combination of the two be even more awesome than the individual parts.